At first glance this dirt bike may look like any other dirt bike that has been painted up and has new plastics. Take a much closer look and read on.

Honda CR500’s are my favorite dirt bike and I have owned four so far. I decided I would build a custom one from the ground up and wanted to build a dirt bike like no one else has done. The build is based on a 1991 Honda CR500R.

Anyone can paint a dirt bike, put on new plastic, and throw a bunch of aftermarket parts on it and call it custom. I wanted to build a truly custom dirt bike — a one-of-a-kind.

The bike took me roughly 14 months to build. My vision was a high power, low noise, “wolf in sheep’s clothing” that would run on pump fuel and rock the custom bike industry with a fresh idea that is a true show-and-go piece.

The bike would mainly be designed to easily switch from torquey off-road/single track riding to hill shooting dune predator in about an hour. A true “Jekyll and Hyde” transformation. I feel I accomplished this idea to a “T.”

When I started building this bike there were some parts I knew I wanted to incorporate into my build — Kawasaki KX450F Kayaba DLC coated forks, Vortex adjustable CDI, and a Honda HPSD steering damper to name few.

I knew the color scheme I wanted. The blue color I wanted to use is from a piece of bar pad plastic that I had from about 10 years ago. I had the color analyzed and was able to have it custom mixed for painting.

I also knew the amount of horsepower I wanted because of another CR500 I had, a Service Honda CR500AF with a nitrous system putting out 74hp.

I found my cylinder porting guru through the CR500 Forum, Glen Howell of GSS Race porting. He massaged the top-end from carb, intake, reed cage, piston, cylinder, head, to exhaust manifold. This work allowed the engine to be spec’d at 73 horsepower on pump fuel.

The bike has been completely reworked in a Resto/Mod fashion. All parts are restored, customized, or new. This bike is custom from front to back.

About three-quarters of the way through the build I realized this was really going to be something special. I decided to enter this bike in a bike show.

Since I live in Central Point, Oregon the biggest and closest bike show that was happening around the time I would be finished was the Good Vibrations Bike Show in Salem, Oregon.

It was fantastic to win first place in the off-road category with my first attempt at a custom motorcycle. I hope to have future opportunities to restore and modify motorcycles of all types and of any year.

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